The chief executive of Swindon Borough Council will not be required to write to the town's two MPs asking them to help overturn a policy they have recently supported in Parliament.

A Conservative motion to the council against the incoming cuts to pensioners' winter fuel allowances by the national Labour government was defeated with Labour councillors, and one Liberal Democrat, voting against it.

If passed it would have mandated the authority’s chief executive to write to the Chancellor requesting that the cut be immediately reversed and to the town’s two Labour MPs asking them to lobby the government so to do, just days after they had voted in favour of the measure.

It would also have asked the council to start a communications campaign to encourage people to sign up for pension credit benefits.

Introducing the motion Councillor Dan Adams said: ”Instead of freezing or cutting heating bills like they promised Labour is conducting a punitive attack on our residents.”

Seconding Councillor Dale Heenan said Labour’s own research when it was in national opposition was that such a cut would lead to the deaths of at least six pensioners in winter and added: “Sympathy and kind words will make no difference sitting at home in the cold. We need action.”

Another Conservative, Councillor Lawrence Elliott said: “Couples over 60 are already known to have the highest average fuel poverty of £268. Many people are now sick with worry. Their worries are real.

Councillor Suresh Gattapur added: ”The winter fuel allowance is not a hand-out, It is recognition that we  as a society will not allow people to fall by the wayside.”

Only one Labour councillor responded to the motion, the backbencher  Councillor Jason Mills.

Cllr Mills said that collaborative working between the Conservative and Labour groups and the administration could have been possible.

But he described the motion, instead as “performative posturing” solely intended to “embarrass Labour councillors.”

He said nobody from the Conservative group had approached the council’s Labour leader to see what could be done, and characterised the motion as purely political.

Liberal Democrat Councillor Adam Pool said: “The Tory group has quoted some alarming figures. But I agree with Cllr Mills that a more pragmatic approach would have been better.”

In a named vote requested by Conservative members, all but one Labour councillor voted against. Councillor Tom Butcher abstained, having declared an interest in that he works for one of the town’s MPs.